SINCE celebrities such as Madonna, Cameron Diaz and Julia Roberts were spotted getting to grips with needles and wool, the historic art of knitting has enjoyed something of a fashionable resurgence.
Adding to the summer of sartorially inspired innovation at the Millennium Gallery courtesy of Vivienne Westwood, a new exhibition in the Design Gallery, Get Knitted, will explore the versatility of this now hip hobby.
European knitting dates fr
om the early 14th Century but it was the Industrial Revolution which first brought mass machine-produced knitwear to the UK. After the war years, knitting had a huge boost as greater colours and styles of yarn were introduced.
During the 1980s, sales of patterns and yarns slumped as consumers could buy ready-made knitwear more cheaply, and as the craft was increasingly seen as old-fashioned.
Since 2004, celebrity endorsement of knitting has led to the development of nation-wide Stitch and Bitch and Knit and Knatter socialising and networking groups, pub-knitting, mass-organised knitting in public (Guerrilla Knitting), and even the first Knitting Olympics (2006).
Get Knitted will include cutting edge contemporary knitwear and 'knit art', as well as a more conventional knitting to show how it can be used both in a domestic and creative environment, and the range of what it can create and achieve.
The exhibition includes works from knitting designers Jemma Sykes, Tait and Style and award-winning recent graduates, alongside a knitting-inspired sound collage by media artist Jeff Goddard and pieces by artists Shane Waltener and Rachael Matthews.
Cast Off founder Matthews orchestrated the world's first completely knitted wedding for knit artist Freddie Robins in 2005.
Get Knitted, which opens on Wednesday and runs to October 26, will be the first exhibition to feature items from this unique event including the wedding dress.
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